Modern Masters: Bruce Timm

MODERN MASTERS VOLUME THREE: BRUCE TIMM by Bruce Timm and Eric Nolen-Weathington

INTRODUCTION by Grant Morrison

It's funny these days, how different everything is. As someone who remembers when public sightings of comic book super-heroes were as rare as Roc flocks flapping through the echoing canyons of Manhattan in the ice cube chill of midwinter's three a.m., it's hard to handle the sensory overload of this world that's come upon us; a world where Batman and Robin and Beast Boy appear on the sides of buses going up and down my street, like giant hallucinations, where marquee posters of Spider-Man, the Hulk, Daredevil and all the rest, replace grim, urban facades with the blue, red and green fever-dreams of the teenage comics fan I once was, and where Doctor Fate, of all people, Doctor Fate can now appear on network cartoon shows enjoyed by millions.

Those of us who grew up nourished only by monthly glimpses of these impossible beings, now live in a world of super-heroes. Their images are everywhere. Life becomes manga. The comic heroes have found their true home in our streets, or our TVs and movie screens, and wrapped around our public transport.

How did this happen? Who really opened the floodgate for this flamboyant inundation of flourescent regalia, alphabet suits and goth noir? Who distilled the power of Kirby, the elegance of Toth and Raymond, the vigor and passion of Adams, the chiaroscuric classicism of Steranko into a magnificent popular vision of the comic book character as contemporary animated hero and made it shine for a mass audience? Who gave us a Batman with all the excitement, grit and edgy pulp romance of modern comics and none of the psychological hang-ups, setting the template for the super-hero action movies of the 21st century? Who raised the bar for serious comic book animation even higher than the Fleisher Brothers' Superman cartoons of the '40s? Whose brilliant and much-imitated designs primed the mass mind for the coming of the super-men into every area of the media?

Need I say more?

Ladies and gentlemen, Mister Bruce Timm, Modern Master deluxe!

Grant Morrison